Frequently Asked Questions

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Q. Who is behind this site and how do I know it is reliable?

A. The Nevada Hospital Association and its member hospitals want to help you make informed decisions about your health care choices through the public reporting of quality performance measures and pricing. As such, we are committed to delivering information that is practical and useful, can play an important role in driving improvements in patient safety and quality and can help control health care costs.

Q. The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) already has a website that compares hospital performance; how is this different and why should I have to look at both?

A. This web site includes nationally recognized hospital performance measures from the CMS Hospital Compare site and also includes results from the National Hospital Safety Network (NHSN) for infections and information from patient accounts that follow the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) logic to determine harm. The information is combined here for the consumer's convenience and to verify accuracy.

Q. Why aren't results for all procedures and medical conditions represented on the site?

A. The Nevada Hospital Association continually adds and retires measure results as reliable and comparable information is made available nationally. Measures are developed based on high volume, high risk criteria

Q. Are the results on this website the only way to find the best hospital for my needs?

A. As you review the information included in this site, keep in mind that individuals have different needs and hospitals have different strengths. This website should be viewed as another source of information you can use to raise questions and should be used in conjunction with your physician's or surgeon's advice. These results do not take the place of conversations between the patient and provider. The importance of communicating with the physician, nurses, and other members of the health care team cannot be understated.

Q. How can knowing these quality results help me, my family, my company or Nevada?

A. Helps every consumer and his or her health care provider make informed decisions .

Help Nevadans learn more about health care.

Make evidence-based health information publicly available and understandable.

Assist hospitals in continuously improving their performance, and thereby, improving the overall quality of care provided to patients.

Provide information that employers and insurers can use as they design benefit packages.

Helps policy maker's measure quality in our hospitals.

Q. How old is this information?

A. The data is refreshed at least every six months, and as hospitals continuously improve the quality and safety of their patient care, it is expected that the results and the measures will change over time. Hospital quality measures will be updated every 3 months, but no longer than annually, as the information becomes available. Here is the website that lists the data reporting collection periods for CMS.

Q. Why doesn't the site include cost information as well as quality?

A. It does. Both quality and cost are available for comparison on this site.